


'Sacrifice To Laughter'

by Spunny



Category: Zero Escape: Nine Hours Nine Persons Nine Doors
Genre: M/M, Non-Consensual Tickling, Other, Tickling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-15
Updated: 2018-11-15
Packaged: 2019-08-23 22:36:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,392
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16627736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spunny/pseuds/Spunny
Summary: Junpei and Ace explore the ship, coming across an odd machine. 'Powered by Laughter' it reads. What could go wrong?





	'Sacrifice To Laughter'

“Powered by laughter  
This machine requires a sacrifice”

“Hmm.” Junpei hummed loudly as he and Ace both stared down at the words staring back at them from a monitor. The group split up when they found a new area of the ship, and Ace and Junpei paired up in their search for the Number 9 door. After testing several doors, all of which were locked, they finally made their way to this room.

The dull green walls had been stripped bare of any decoration, and all that was in the room was the large computer console, complete with the screen and ominous message, and a single chair that sat in the middle of the room. On the other side of the room was a single, metallic door. 

Locked, of course.

Every attempt to mess with the console had proven fruitless. The keys were unresponsive, and enough rapid pressing was enough for it to blare a buzzer, loud enough to make Junpei jump. It seemed the only option left was to sit in the chair, but that had its own risks as well.

The chair itself was unusual. It had several metallic cuffs along its foundation. Two around the arms, two where the feet would be. Obviously meant to restrain someone, but for what reason? It sat in the middle of a large circle in the floor, where there were several circular hatches, each one closed, each one without a handle. Whatever was down there, it wouldn’t come out until someone sat in the chair.

“Hmm.” Both hummed again.

“Whatever it is, it obviously wants us to sit in this chair.” Ace said, more to himself than Junpei. “Other than the console and chair, there isn’t anything else in this room. I can’t imagine what kind of puzzle this might relate to though. And what about this ‘laughter’ bit?”

“Yeah.” Junpei said, staring at the words as if he could uncover their secret. No matter how hard he stared though, the secrets remained hidden. And he stared hard. Really hard.

“Why don’t I take a seat in the chair?”

Junpei jumped at Ace’s voice, and quickly coughed in an attempt to cover it up. . He had been so focused on the monitor, he had completely forgotten Ace had been standing there. He took a quick glance at Ace and saw he had on eyebrow raised in a curious look. It seemed Junpei wasn’t all that subtle. Damn.

“Really? Why do you wanna do that?” Junpei asked, quick to get onto another topic. Not that he wasn’t for it; truth be told he sure didn’t want to sit in that chair, but this would be the second time Ace volunteered for something. He started to wonder if he was brave or had a death wish.

“Well, what if it turned out to be deadly? I don’t want to risk you getting hurt. You’re still young and, well, I’ve lived a life longer than yours.” He said this with a smile meant to comfort Junpei, but Junpei could see he was nervous about it too. He was just being a nice guy.

“Uh...well...” Junpei hesitated. He didn’t want to actually risk Ace, or anyone for that matter, getting hurt by one of Zero’s games. But he was hesitant to sit in the chair, himself; last time someone tried to stop Ace, he ended up doing it anyways. More so, the door on the other side of the room wasn’t going to unlock until they finished the puzzle, and there was no getting around that.

In the end, it was just easier, and quicker, to go along with Ace.

“Fine, just… be careful, alright?” Even as he said the words, he couldn’t help but feel they were silly. There were clasps on the chair, obviously whoever sat would be restrained. If anything happened, Ace wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. Not unless he was secretly a superhero, but Junpei doubted it.

Judging by Ace’s face, he thought the same thing. He was nervous, but regardless of how he felt, he gave Junpei a smile and a nod of affirmation. Then, hesitantly, he walked to the chair, each step loud in the otherwise silent room. He stared at it as he approached, getting more and more nervous with each step. Finally, after swallow hard, he moved to sit in it.

He shifted around a bit, trying to find a comfortable position while still keeping his arms and legs in the open clasps. “I gotta say, I was hoping it would be a bit more comfortable than this.” He said with some disappointment. “Why don’t you see if the console will work now, Junpei?”

“Alright.” Junpei looked down at the console, the screen still displaying that ominous message. Hesitantly, nervously, he reached up and pressed a random key on the console. This time it responded.

The entire screen went black. Junpei was wondering if he broke it when coding began to appear, a bunch of words, numbers, and symbols that Junpei wouldn’t have been able to make heads or tails of. Not that it mattered in the long run; he only managed to see a portion of it before it disappeared, replaced by another set of words.

‘TEST SUBJECT DETECTED  
PROGRAM NOW ENGAGING’

There was a hissing. Junpei looked up just in time to see the metal clasps around Ace’s wrists and ankles close with a loud metallic clank. Ace swallowed hard, looking at the clasps and giving them a test tug. 

Junpei couldn’t blame him for being nervous, there was no telling what could happen. After all they’ve been through, who knew what other sadistic number Zero had planned for them.

“You okay?” Junpei asked.

“Y-Yeah.” Ace called out. Junpei could clearly hear the tremble and shake in Ace’s voice. Ace’s facade was falling, and he looked more and more nervous by the second. Junpei wasn’t feeling much better.

He looked down at the screen as more letters began to appear  
.  
‘SUBJECT IS NOW RESTRAINED  
SUBJECT WILL BE RESTRAINED UNTIL THE END OF THE EXPERIMENT  
GOAL: LEARN TO FOCUS, EVEN THROUGH DISTRACTIONS SUCH AS LOUD SOUND AND LAUGHTER  
EACH FAILURE WILL ONLY INCREASE THE DISTRACTIONS  
CONTINUE WITH THE EXPERIMENT?  
Y/N’

Junpei swallowed hard. He didn’t exactly want to hit ‘Yes,’ but considering how things have been going, hitting the ‘No’ may have been just as bad, if not worse. There was no telling what lay in store for them, for any of their choices, on this ship. The only choice, or, maybe, the best choice, was just to go forward.

He highlighted the Y on the screen and hit enter.

The screen went black. A few seconds passed, long enough for Junpei to wonder if it broke from age or something. It was covered with a layer of dust. Even Ace looked at him questioningly, curious as to what was going on on Junpei’s side. Just when Junpei was about to give up and give the console a solid whack, he heard it.

It was a soft whirring. Something coming to life, albeit slowly. It was just on the edge of hearing; something you’d miss if you weren’t concentrating on it. Then it slowly began to grow, louder and louder. A loud whirring that put Junpei on edge. And judging by Ace looking around, he could guess he felt similar.

Then it stopped. Silence hung in the air. Junpei couldn’t help but keep constantly looking around, half expecting for something to pop out like a...giant chainsaw! Okay, okay, that was dumb, but this whole situation was unnerving as it was.

However, nothing did pop out. At least, nothing either expected. Instead of drills, probes, scalpels, or lasers, what the hatches revealed as they slid open were several hands. Mechanical, metallic, each finger a segment made of metal and attached to small ball joints, each one ending at the wrist and attached to long, thin lines of metal, each one as flexible as the fingers.

“Wha…?”Junpei voice trailed off. He watched them lower down, close to Ace’s body. Ace stiffened up, looking at them in a confused yet guarded manner. They didn’t look exactly threatening, but you never knew in this place.

Junpei’s was distracted by the scene by a beeping from the console. He looked down, reading the new words flashing on the screen.

PRESS ANY KEY TO START

Junpei swallowed hard. He raised a hand, held it over one of the keys on the console.  
“I’m going to start it now, okay, Ace?” He asked, voice trembling. He looked over at his bound friend, waiting for his consent.

Ace swallowed. He was practically sweating where he was, eyes dashing from metallic hand to metallic hand, worry on his face. Still, it was too late to turn back. So he simply nodded at Junpei. “Y-Yeah. Go ahead. I’m ready.”

Ace nodded. He licked his lips nervously. He pressed down on a random key, feeling it click underneath his finger.

The hands lowered.

Ace began to laugh.

Junpei blinked in surprise. Instead of doing anything sinister, the hands had...well, they acted differently than expected. Instead of torturing Ace, they began to….tickle him.

The hands were dancing over Ace’s body. Some of them were at his stomach, gently digging into the soft skin. The others were at his sides, running up and down them in slow motions. All of them worked on tickling the older man.

And unfortunately, Ace was ticklish.

He began to laugh as soon as the hands began their assault, squirming around in the chair. The restraints held tight, though, and all he could do was squirm without so much as getting an inch. The laugh bubbled out of him, a smile forced on his face, and the chair rattled a bit as he tried to break free from his bondage.

“Huh.” Junpei said, watching the sight in front of him. “I expected something a bit more sinister from Zero, but...not this.” He watched as one hand trailed higher up Ace’s shirt, before suddenly digging into his armpit, getting an adorable shriek of laughter out of the big guy. “It’s kinda...cute.”

“Hahaha-e-e-easy for you to say!” Ace said between laughs, still squirming about in his seat. “J-j-just finish ii-ihihihit!” Ace laughed as the hands danced over his body. He threw his head back, laughter pouring out of him as the machine’s fingers gently dug into him.

“Er...right.” Junpei said, looking back and forth between Ace and the puzzle in front of him. It looked like nothing more than a simple Sudoku puzzle; put some numbers here, some there, and make sure none repeated. Simple enough.

Still, it was distracting to have Ace laughing right next to him. Junpei was doing his best to work on the puzzle, double checking his answers, making sure all the numbers fit, but it was hard. His eyes kept going back and forth between the screen and the laughing Ace. Worse, he realized he couldn’t delete anything once it had been put down. As soon as he placed a number, it was set.

All combined together, maybe that explained what happened.

He put everything together, inserted the last answer, moved to hit the enter button and…

There was a loud buzzer. The screen flashed red. It stayed like that for a few solid seconds before it eventually faded away, going back to the image of the Sudoku puzzle, only…

It was different. More of it was gone. While previously it had maybe 20 numbers missing, this time it had 35.

“H-Hey!”

 

Ace’s voice distracted Junpei, and the younger man looked up at his older companion, who was now looking nervously around him. More hands had appeared now, and they wiggled their fingers menacingly at Ace. The ones that had been tickling him beforehand had paused, but, as the hands grew closer to him, it was obviously not for anything good.

 

Ace let out strangled, surprised cries of pretests as they dove towards him. They grabbed at his clothes, pulling at them. His shirt was slowly yanked and rolled up, exposing his bare skin, his abs, his chest, his entire upper body. Some of them went to the his pants, fiddling around with the crotch until it managed to unbutton them. Slowly, it lowered them down, not much, but just enough to exposed his hips. Junpei couldn’t help but notice the dark trail of hair, leading down to the more private areas of Ace.

His entire body already had a slight sheen of sweat. He was panting, taking in deep breaths of air, and Junpei couldn’t help but think this entire image had something almost...erotic. Like it was a private moment and he was being some kind of voyeur.

 

He must have made some noise, or perhaps it was the lack of him making any, that attracted Ace’s attention. Those blue eyes looked at him, and Junpei could see the desperation of his situation mixed with anger at Junpei’s stalling.

 

“Finish the damn puzzle!”

 

Junpei jumped at Ace’s voice, coming off so demanding and authoritative, different from his usual calm demeanor. No doubt this was getting to him. Junpei’s face flushed in embarrassment as he looked down at the half-empty Sudoku puzzle, halfheartedly getting back to work on it.

 

“Y-Yeah, I”m on it!” He called out to Ace as he began to work on it once more.

As soon as he put in the first number, he heard laughter again. He tried to keep himself focused, adding another number, and another, but he couldn’t block out the noise of the laughter. He couldn't stop himself from looking up at the restrained man.

The hands were everywhere now. Several of them had grown feathers from the tips of their fingers and were attacking his stomach, circling his belly button in slow motions, occasionally dipping into it. Two of them were now counting his rips, teasing his sides, getting him to squirm away from one hand and directly into the other. He managed to see two of them grow small bristles from the tips of their fingers before sliding up under his shirt, attacking his armpits.

This seemed to get a great reaction from him, because the man’s head jerked back and he released a loud torrent of laughter. He was thrashing in his seat, the chair squeaking and wobbling as he attempted to break free. But it held firm, and held him in place to endure his torture.

Junpei was mesmerized by the sight. He didn’t pay attention at all to what he was doing. Hell, he didn’t even realize he was still playing with the console until the buzzer went off again.

He let out a surprised yelp, looking down at the red screen, now a bright red. He swallowed hard. Oops.

“N-No! No!”

Two more hands sprang up, this time from right in front of the chair. At Ace’s protests, one of them gave him a little wave, before they reached forward, grabbing at his shoes. Ace still continued to protest, desperate “No”s, “Stop”s, and “No more”s escaping from him as they tugged the shoes off his wiggling feet. Next came his socks, two of the metal fingers gripping the sweaty cloth and tugging at them in an almost dainty manner, sliding them off slowly, then tossing them to the side when they were done.

 

Then there came his shoes. The robotic hands grabbed at his shoes, tugging him off. Junpei could see Ace shaking his head, hurriedly saying “No no no” in desperation, wiggling his feet helplessly. The mechanical hands gripped his shoes, yanking them off easily.

 

Junpei was frozen in place. He watched Ace plead, knowing what was coming and fearful of it. He watched as the hands disappeared into the slots they came from, reappearing with boar bristle brushes, and making the bound man lose all color in his face. He supposed he should’ve done something like, say, work on the puzzle. But he didn’t. He just watched.

 

Then the hands attacked.

 

Ace howled with laughter. He bucked, he thrashed, the chair creaked and groaned underneath his struggles, as if it was about to break. It looked like it shouldn’t endure this type of punishment, but regardless, it held. Worse, it held Ace’s feet tightly, keeping him from moving them so much as an inch. They brushed at his feet, and every time his toes clenched, another pair of hands joined in to help, restraining them, exposing his full sole for torture.

 

Junpei swore he could see tears streaking down Ace’s face as he laughed and thrashed, worn out by this unusual torture. “F-Finihihihish the puzzle-ahahaha! Pleeeaaase!” Ace laughed out. Junpei felt bad by his watching...and worse, how he wanted to keep watching.

 

Eventually, his guilt won him over. He began to insert the numbers on the screen, eyes double checking everything, eyes constantly going back to Ace’s laughing form. He swallowed hard. He hoped this was right, otherwise who knew what it’d do next…

 

He inserted the last number. He hit the enter key.

 

There was a light beep. The screen turned green.

 

TEST COMPLETE.  
RELEASING SUBJECT.

 

Finally, the hands stopped. They withdrew from the older man. The one at his feet gave him another wave goodbye, before they all descended down into the slots in the floor, a metallic clang heard as the doors closed behind them.

 

Ace was panting, breathing deeply as he attempted to regain himself. Anytime Junpei even got too close to him, Ace would giggle, instinctively turning away from the younger man. Apparently the torture left him hypersensitive, and even the image of the hands coming towards him was enough to set him off.

 

All Junpei could do was patiently, keeping his back turn to keep his eyes off the half-naked man. His face was burning red now, and some part of him really regretted putting a stop to it so early.

 

Finally, after what felt like ages, Ace finally spoke.

 

“W-Well, that was an...experience. I certainly wasn’t expecting that. I hope that’s the last of these experiments that require ‘laughter.’” Ace said, voice shaky.

 

“Y-Yeah.” Junpei responded, face flushed, gaze still averted. “U-Uh, y-y-Ya mind putting your clothes back on now?” His throat was dry. His tongue felt weird. And he shifted his pants by the waistband, hoping to do so without looking quite so obvious in his intents.

 

He wasn’t sure if he was actually successful. He heard Ace clear his throat, and said in an embarrassed tone ‘Yeah. Sorry about that.’

 

Junpei heard the sound of cloth being moved, the sound of a belt buckle being put into place before a pair of buttons snapped together. Then he felt the chair squeak as Ace stood up, clearing his throat in embarrassment.

 

“W-Well, let’s proceed, shall we?” Ace asked, gesturing to the door on the other side of the room.

 

“Y-Yeah.” Junpei said, perhaps a little too quickly, and moved, perhaps a little too fast, towards the door leading away from the weird, fetishy chair.

 

He grabbed the handle of the door, the handle freezing cold against his skin. He swallowed hard and twisted it, metal screeching against metal in a protest at the sudden, and uncommon, movement. Then he pulled, using all his might as the heavy door gradually swung open…

 

There in the middle of the room was a rack. The kind you strap a person into, meant to hold them in an X-shape. There were countless little holes all throughout the sides of them, and at the top metal bar read a single phrase.

 

“Sacrifice to Laughter.”

 

The silence was practically palpable. Neither one of them said anything. Finally, after what felt likes ages, Junpei found the courage to speak.

 

“Hey, A-”

Junpei stopped when a heavy hand fell on his shoulder. He looked up and saw Ace’s face darken. He didn’t look as voluntary as last time. In fact, he looked almost...evil. 

As soon as he thought this, Junpei was being shoved forward, towards the rack. 

“Uh-Ace, I-” 

“I think it’s only fair you take a turn, Junpei.” Ace’s voice was dark, almost describable as sadistic glee. “Don’t worry, I’ll do my best to solve this puzzle.” 

Junpei swallowed hard and let out a small internal whimper.


End file.
